This invention is generally concerned with methods and apparatus for processing sheets and more particularly with methods and apparatus for controlling an inserter.
This application is one of the following five related U.S. Patent Applications filed concurrently herewith by James S. Ramsey and assigned to the same Assignee: Ser. No. 07/577,721 for Portable Apparatus For Supporting Sheets; Ser. No. 07/577,712 for Methods of Processing Sheets Having An Order Corresponding to the Order of Stored Data; Ser. No. 07/577,726 for Assembling Apparatus Including Means for Matching Coded Sheets; Ser. No. 07/577,728 for Sheet Processing Apparatus Including Memory Means Removably Connected Thereto; and Ser. No. 07/577,724 for Methods and Apparatus for Controlling An Inserter.
In a typical inserter, which is utilized by large business mailers for preparing mailpieces which include collations of multiple sheets, such as cards, forms, letters, return envelopes and remittance slips, and other sheets, stuffed into envelopes, the first sheet fed into a downstream path of travel for collation with other sheets fed from other feeding stations is marked with a processing code which includes data for controlling the selection of the other sheets. The coded sheet is referred to in the art as a control document and is normally fed into its downstream path of travel from the most upstream sheet feeding station of the inserter. As the control document is fed downstream, the code thereon is successively sensed by conventional sensing structures located at each of the downstream sheet feeding stations, which are known in the art as an insert stations. In response to sensing the code, sheets are fed from one or more of the insert stations for collation with the control document. In some commercially available inserters the sheet feeding path for the control document is the same as that of the insert sheets, whereas in others, the sheet feeding paths for the control document and insert sheets converge at an accumulating and envelope stuffing station, where the control document and selected insert sheets are collated and inserted into a suitable mailing envelope. In either instance, the typical inserter includes as many code sensing structures as there are insert stations, and the control document code is repeatedly scanned to determine whether or not a given insert station has been selected for feeding a sheet for collation with the control document. Moreover, the order in which insert sheets are associated with a given control document is normally determined by the physical order in which the insert stations are located along the downstream path of travel, as a result of which insert sheets are normally stacked in a particular order at the insert stations along the path of travel to insure that properly sequenced collations are prepared. Accordingly:
An object of the invention is to provide improved methods and apparatus for controlling an inserter;
Another object is to provide methods and apparatus for utilizing any sheet feeding station of an inserter, including the mailing envelope feeding station, for use as the source of supply of the processing code for a given collation;
Another object is to provide methods and apparatus for simplifying the structure of an inserter, including permitting the provision of fewer code sensing structures; and
Another object is to provide improved methods and apparatus for preparing mailpieces in an inserter.